Assessing Napoli’s Summer Transfer Market

After two years of financial hardship, exacerbated by missing the Champions League, Aurelio De Laurentiis pushed the ‘reset’ button, bidding farewell to club legends and welcoming young, relatively unknown starlets – a strategy that got Napoli into the Champions League in the first place. After a flurry of activity in the final two weeks, the transfer window closed on September 1st. Forza Napoli Press assesses SSC Napoli’s summer mercato.

Departures

After breaking the club’s press silence in June of 2021, Napoli President Aurelio De Laurentiis declared that the club had two goals for the 2021/22 campaign: balance the books and qualify for the Champions League.

The Partenopei achieved the former, finishing third under the guidance of new coach Luciano Spalletti. Meanwhile, De Laurentiis set out to achieve the latter, reportedly imposing an individual player salary cap of €3.5 million net per season.

That equated to making low-ball offers to club legends and fan-favourites alike. It wasn’t long before the hashtag ‘#A16’ was trending on social media – a reference to the highway that leads from Napoli to Bari, home of De Laurentii’s other club.

In January, then-captain Lorenzo Insigne announced he would join Toronto FC at the end of the season, becoming the first of several senatori who would depart from Napoli in the summer.

Faouzi Ghoulam, once considered amongst the top left backs in the world, spent most of his time at Napoli on the recovery table. After Napoli’s final home match of 2021/2022 campaign, the humble Algerian walked quietly at the back of the pack during Insigne’s lap of honour, already aware his contract would not be extended.

Like Insigne and Ghoulam, the contracts of David Ospina and Dries Mertens were not extended either. Ospina found the higher salary he was seeking at Al-Nassr Riad in the Saudi Professional League. In general, goalkeepers are grossly underpaid, so the decision of the 34-year-old was understandable – a final big pay-day before retirement.

Meanwhile, the club’s all-time leading goal-scorer, Dries Mertens, could not reach an agreement with Napoli after a prolonged negotiation. In August, the Belgian bid a heartfelt see you later, not goodbye to Napoli as he joined Galatasaray AS in the Turkish Süper Lig, hoping to play regularly ahead of the FIFA World Cup in Qatar.

With the departures of Mertens and Insigne, and Allan before the them, De Laurentiis cleared out the supposed leaders of the now-infamous mutiny of 2019.

Having addressed the expiring contracts (or perhaps not addressed them), the Napoli owner moved on to the players with only one year remaining on their contracts.

After years of being told he was for sale, Kalidou Koulibaly flipped the script and requested a move. The (happily?) club obliged, selling the Senegal captain to Chelsea FC for €38 million.

Next was Fabian Ruiz, who was sold to PSG for €23 million after declining multiple offers to extend his contract with Napoli. Finally, Adam Ounas was sold to Lille on the final day of the window for €3 million.

If that wasn’t enough, gli Azzurri also loaned Andrea Petagna to Monza for €2.5 million, with an obligation to buy for €12.5 million. However, that obligation is conditional on Monza staying up, which seems unlikely at the moment given their slow start to the campaign.

Arrivals

Cristiano Giuntoli had his busiest summer since joining Napoli in 2015. The club’s Sporting Director was hard at work long before the summer transfer market opened.

Though he officially joined the club on July 1st, Georgian wonder-kid Khvicha Kvaratskhelia was announced as a new Napoli player by De Laurentiis in an interview with Radio Kiss Kiss on April 27th. The ex-Dinamo Batumi player was signed to replace Insigne on the left wing.

Similarly, Napoli announced the signing of ex-Getafe player Mathias Olivera on May 24th. The Uruguayan left back was brought in to replace Ghoulam. Earlier that day, De Laurentiis confirmed that André-Frank Zambo Anguissa had joined Napoli on a permanent deal after completing his loan from Fulham FC.

Napoli made two acquisitions in July. Leo Østigård, who played for Genoa CFC last season, was purchased from Brighton & Hove Albion FC. The Norway international was signed to replace the Axel Tuanzebe, who in turn was loaned from Manchester United for six months to fill the void left behind by Kostas Manolas.

Two weeks later, gli Azzurri purchased Min-jae Kim from Fenerbahçe SK for €18 million. Napoli’s largest summer expenditure to that point, Kim was acquired to fill the very large boots of Koulibaly.

By the end of July, it was clear that De Laurentiis was going back to what had worked in the past – signing young, relatively unknown players from lower-ranked leagues.

With this approach, Napoli qualified for the Champions League seven times in nine seasons between 2011 and 2020. Yet many Napoli tifosi were justifiably unconvinced that a Georgian playing in Russia and a South Korean playing in Turkey could adequately replace club legends Insigne and Koulibaly, respectively.

However, the fans’ confidence was partially restored with Napoli’s four acquisitions in August. Veteran goalkeeper Salvatore Sirigu was brought in to replace Ospina, at least on paper. In reality, Alex Meret replaced Ospina and Sirigu filled the vacancy at the backup goalkeeper position.

Sirigu does not only fill a gap in the squad list. He also fills the void in leadership left behind with the departures of Insigne, Mertens, Koulibaly and Ospina. The club hopes that Sirigu can play a similar role for Napoli that he played for Italy during their Euro 2020-winning run – a veteran leader and motivator in the locker room. Sirigu can also help Meret, whose confidence took a major blow after three different managers made Ospina their first choice goalkeeper.

For a while, it appeared that Meret would not slide into that number one role. Napoli were heavily linked to Chelsea’s Kepa Arrizabalaga and PSG’s Kaylor Navas, but couldn’t close either deal before the window slammed shut.

Meanwhile, Giuntoli painted the final strokes of his masterpiece. Giovanni Simeone was acquired from Hellas Verona on loan with option to buy. The Argentinian, who scored a career-high of 17 goals last season, is a clear upgrade to Petagna as backup striker. Yet, El Cholito was purchased on near identical payment terms as with the sale of Petagna to Monza.

The following day (August 19th), Tanguy Ndombele signed for the Partenopei. Tottenham Hotspur FC, who paid a club record transfer fee of €63 million to acquire the Frenchman from Lyon in 2019, agreed to pay the majority of Ndombele’s salary. The negotiation for Fabian Ruiz’ replacement was completed in record time, concluding only days after rumours of the transfer first surfaced.

Finally, with a week-and-a-half to go before the deadline, Napoli confirmed their third signing in three days: Giacomo Raspadori. After another prolonged negotiation, the 22-year-old joined Napoli from US Sassuolo on loan for €5 million, with an obligation to buy for €25 million, payable over multiple years. Raspadori, who was purchased to replace Mertens, only wanted Napoli, a common theme with the incoming players this summer.

Net Effect

Financially, De Laurentiis achieved exactly what he set out to do, reducing the club’s net wage bill from €61.7 to €45.2 million, a 27% reduction.

The Napoli president remarkably generated capital gains of approximately €64 million from players in the final year of their respective contracts.

Before redeeming options/obligations, Napoli’s nine acquisitions cost a total of €70.3 million in loan and transfer fees. The purchases (totaling €61.3 million) were eclipsed by the sales, though the purchases will be amortized over the terms of those contracts.

De Laurentiis also succeeded in building a young squad, reducing the team’s average age from 27.6 to 25.7:

• 31-year-old Insigne was replaced by 21-year-old Kvaratskhelia;
• 31-year-old Ghoulam was replaced by 22-year-old Olivera;
• 31-year-old Manolas was effectively replaced by 22-year-old Østigård;
• 31-year-old Koulibaly was replaced by 25-year-old Kim; and
• 35-year-old Mertens was replaced by 22-year-old Raspadori.

And so a new cycle begins. Time will tell whether the youngsters can live up to the high standards set by their predecessors, but Kvara, Kim and even Østigård have impressed in the early stages of their Napoli tenures.

On the contrary, Simeone, Ndombele and Raspadori, the last of the summer signings, have been less influential in their debuts. None were with the club for the retreats at Dimaro and Castel di Sangro, and it has shown. The newcomers are clearly still learning Spalletti’s system. While De Laurentiis and Giuntoli did an admirable job finding quality replacements on a budget, some business was left to the final two weeks of the window, leaving the aforementioned players little time to settle in.

Finally, the goalkeeper position remains a concern, and for many could be the reason Napoli fail to win the scudetto. Meret has had a decent start to the season, recording two clean sheets – largely with the help of his back line – and stopping a penalty kick against Monza. The shot-stopper will have until January to secure his place as the permanent number one. Meanwhile, Giuntoli will continue to negotiate for potential replacements in January.

Transfer Market Rating – 7.5